


Derek's Babies

by goddessofcruelty



Series: Big House [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: A teeny bit of angst, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Puppies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-23
Updated: 2014-05-23
Packaged: 2018-01-26 05:59:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1677329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddessofcruelty/pseuds/goddessofcruelty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek cleans the newborn pup just as carefully as he had the others, weighs him and marks it down in his book before settling the little runt down with his brothers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Derek's Babies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seraphim_grace](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seraphim_grace/gifts).



> Prompt: I want to spend time with Derek and his babies

“C'mon, Lady, you're almost there. Just a little more and there! That's the last one, sweetling. Rest now, you've earned it.” He rubs Lady's head lightly. “Well done, girl.” Derek lets her sleep while the pups nuzzle for milk.

Derek cleans the newborn pup just as carefully as he had the others, weighs him and marks it down in his book before settling the little runt down with his brothers.

He settles at his desk and records, _Sainted Lady of Stars whelped five, all male_.

Chris snorts. “Lady? Really?”

Derek eyes the man where he's washing up. “Says the guy who calls his mare Brownie.”

Chris laughs. “Touche, my friend.”

He wipes his hands on a towel and wanders over to eye the pups.

“What are you going to name them?”

Derek rises and leans on the partition next to Chris.

“I'm not sure of most of them, but see that one at the end, still squirming to get milk? That's Champ?”

Chris snickers. “Champ?”

Derek nods seriously. “See how he's always fighting, always trying to get the best position, more milk than the others? He's been doing that since he came out.”

Chris nods, thinking about his horses. “Alright, I'll grant you that one.”

“Our Lady's Champion, should do it, I think.”

Chris smiles, settles a hand on Derek's shoulder a moment and then leaves him.

Derek will stay up the night, watching the pups for birthing complications.

-

He begins training them right away. Not real hunting training, of course, but he trains them to know his scent, to associate it with comfort and home and food.

He trains their noses by pulling them a little further away each day and making them sniff their way to Lady's milk.

Derek is present at every feeding. The first five weeks are exhausting.

After that, he starts weaning them. Most handlers set specific time goals for it, but Derek does it by feel.

They don't like the food at first. But Boyd and Derek work together to create the right blend of things, and soon they are eating from the pan happily.

He also finishes naming them. There's Tricky (who's always sneaking up on the others and stealing their food) and Char (for the black smudge across his side that looks like charcoal).

“That one trying to eat the dandelion is Russ, for the red hue to his coat.” Derek is explaining to Scott, who couldn't care less, but he's humoring his older brother. “And finally, we have Grace.”

Scott watches that one trip over his own paws, then get up, and bound right into a tree.

“You should call him Stiles.” Scott grins as Derek laughs.

Another week and he starts taking them out one by one, hiding treats in tall grass for them to find. Unsurprisingly, Tricky picks it up the quickest. Champ's almost as fast to learn.

Russ is absolutely hopeless.

“I should have named you Lazy,” Derek tells him as he rubs the russet hound's belly before he leaps up and goes sniffing flowers again.

“What is it with you and flow- _Oh_.”

Derek gets an idea.

“Well, sir, he's hopeless with hunting, he'll never make the cut. But he's real fond of flowers and, well Scott is too...”

Chris, or Lord Argent now, since he's apparently come out of hiding, had been the easy sell. He gets what it feels like to put your pup (or well, foal in his case) in just the perfect place for them.

The hard sell is Stiles. Because he doesn't want to let an asset go without acceptable remuneration.

Derek frowns down at Stiles, looming over that stupid fancy desk of his, and shrugs. “Take my pay until the pup is paid off then.”

Stiles rises, a hand with its long, elegant fingers reaching out to curl around the side of Derek's neck, thumb stroking the older mans' throat.

He leans in and whispers into Derek's ear. “I'm sure we can come to some other arrangement.”

Derek blinks. Oh. _OH_. He shivers softly, and his voice is rough when he finally answers.

“Um, yes. That's...acceptable.”

-

“I thought you were training them.”

Derek starts guiltily, because he'd half-fallen asleep on the picnic blanket, with all the little fuzzy bodies curled up at his sides.

Except for Grace, who'd climbed on top of Derek, managed to put a paw right into his balls, and then got another one stuck in Derek's shirt, and flopped over to sleep on the man's stomach.

“We're on a break.” Derek grins up at his brother, who's carrying Russ.

“You shouldn't carry him, it'll only make him lazier.”

Scott shakes his head. “He's tuckered out. He spent the afternoon weeding. Actually _weeding_ , Derek. This is the smartest dog in existence! He's earned the right to be carried.”

Derek rolls his eyes.

“He'll make a good companion for the baby, too,” Scott says slyly.

Derek sits up so fat that Grace goes rolling down his legs, and lands right on top of Champ with a plop. Neither of them wake up.

“Really? Congratulations! I'm going to be an uncle.” He grabs Scott in a big bear hug. “Good for you two.”

They talk for a minute but Scott needs to get back to the garden, so Derek congratulates him once again and then shakes his hand before they part ways.

Derek gathers up the blanket and the basket, and takes off running. Tricky and Champ give chase right away. It takes Char a minute and then he tears off after the others, easily catching up to them. He's the fastest of the four. Grace trips and faceplants into a puddle but eventually sorts himself out and follows the others.

They run all the way home.

-

The worst day is the one where Derek has to choose the pups to go. They're all trained hunting dogs now, and good ones, Derek doesn't raise slackers, but he's got to justify the sale not only to himself but to the Lords Argent.

“Champ and Char, sirs. I'd like to keep Tricky, breed that cunning back into the line. And Grace, well, he'll never be as good as the others, but he's real steady and cheerful, could balance out a flighty, nervous nature if we breed him out.”

Stiles gnaws on his pen and nods to Peter and Chris. “I agree.”

And so it's done.

Our Lady's Champion and Charcoal's Dust are recorded as sold.

Derek spends the night with the remaining pups, and if he cries a little bit, well that's between him and his straw mattress.


End file.
